try aleve d for strong, all day long sinus and headache relief. >> steve: tell us about jack's into the wild. >> a show we do all over the world.

we leave to different countries. >> brian: what do you have in your arms? >> a dingo. from australia. people heard about it. they don't bark a lot. >> brian: more on that in the after the show show. see you. bill: all right. good morning. everybody. there are breaking developments, many of them in the hostage matter involving american oil workers. we're getting conflicting reports. some reports of a airstrike leaving many dead on the ground. we're hearing 20 hostages including some americans were able to escape. we're working through this throughout the morning. a lot of headlines out of the air. we'll bring to you what we can. i'm bill hemmer. welcome to "america's newsroom.". martha: good morning, everybody, i'm martha maccallum. this drama started yesterday when an al qaeda linked group of terrorists took dozens of hostages at a natural gas plant in algeria. the militants say they wanted france to stop their

campaign against al qaeda fighters in nearby mali. bill: greg palkot working the story today just like yesterday out of london. what can we report about what is happening with these hostages, greg? >> reporter: bill, martha, this is a fast moving story. just in the past hour it shifted considerably. let's walk you through it quickly. algerian security sources talking to local media had been claiming initially that many of the foreign hostages being held by the al qaeda-linked militants at this natural gas complex in al fear yaw had been freed. as many as their latest number was 25 foreigners freed. our own jennifer griffin quoting her sources in the u.s. government saying in fact some of those freed were americans. maybe one american in fact even called his family. it all shifted again according to reports of the at least militants, the militants holding these captors talking to another regional news agency saying as many as 35 foreign hostages had been killed and

that 15 captors had been killed as well. this a part of some sort of an assault by the algerian security forces arounded that complex. we know from the u.k. foreign office here in the past hour that there is some kind of an assault going on. what appears to be happening is algerian helicopters are strafing or bombing locations. the claim is they're hitting vehicles, vehicles, maybe holding hostages, american, maybe foreign hostages at the very least. other nationalities involved, british it, irish, french, japanese. some injured. there was at least one british person killed. but again a fluid situation, bill. bill: fluid indeed. now is this a reaction to what is happening in neighboring mali and the update us what is happening there, greg? >> reporter: the leader of the group that has assaulted this gas complex and taken these hostages said yesterday this was a response to the french government assault on the islamist rebels, the

al qaeda-linked militants in the western african country of mali. that french operation continues today. there continues a ground assault, fighting between french soldiers and militant rebels in various towns not too far from the capital of that country but again the focus right now what is exactly happening on the ground in algeria. are the americans and other foreign hostages safe? have they been killed? all we know there is an assault going on. the numbers, we're still sorting out, bill. bill: we'll get updates throughout the morning. greg, thanks from london on that. to our viewers at home here is a bit of what is happening in this area. you've been following the events in egypt the last two years. and qaddafi in libya as well. here is mali, where greg just mentioned where the islamists taken control on the northern half of the country. in between all this you have that gas field located about the 60 to 80 miles west of the libyan border here in al gear. earlier yesterday we were told islamists out of mali

moved to this gas field to take these american hostages and others. then we were told late last night the islamists originated in libya. today the story suggests that the islamists are homegrown. they live and freight out of algeria. whatever the case in this part of the world the focus is on the gas plant here in southeastern algeria. we'll watch for developments to what's happening there throughout the day. so we'll get updates from greg palkot in london. jennifer griffin working her sources at the pentagon. martha. martha: so many questions about all of this. one of them is whether terrorists have perhaps been embowlened by the lack of action by the united states in response to our attack on our embassy in benghazi. remember nobody has been brought to justice for the killing of our ambassador and three other americans. that raised the question discussed by general jack keane and charles krauthamer. we'll talk to ambassador john bolton. we'll get his take. he will join us later in

"america's newsroom.". now to a story that is rocking the sports world. a story that is so bizarre that we are all talking about it. still trying to put the pieces of this together. it all started in september with reports that star notre dame football player, manti te'o's grandmother and girlfriend tragically, supposedly had died within hours of each other. just a couple of days later, he went onto the play the game of his life. he made national headlines for his courage in the face of so much heartache. he gave multiple interviews like this one. >> why me? why them? why all in one day? this is six hours ago i just found out my grandma passed away. you take, you know, the love of my life. it's a lot of questions and, it was a very dark time.

martha: boy, he tugged at so many heartstrings across the country with this story. he went on to become a heisman trophy finalist. he finished second in the voting there. as you all remember he played for the national championship, losing to alabama this month. the story of his girlfriend, parttoryline that led up to that big game, reports about it in "sports illustrated" and cbs news and all over the place doing up close and personal profiles on this player. we now find out this story about the girlfriend was a big lie or a big hoax or somewhere in between. the story that she died, you know, this is a woman who simply did not exist. so so many questions remain today. when did the university know? they made a big statement on his behalf last evening. was te'o a victim? or perhaps as a friend of his suggested in on this whole thing? mike tobin is live in chicago. mike, boy, you know the question i pose to you who

is telling the truth? i know you don't have the answer to that at this point but lay this out for us if you can? >> reporter: whether this was an internet prank gone over the top or some type of convoluted attempt at promotion the only thing that is clear somebody somewhere is laying on the blarnye. the administration with the fighting irish is standing behind their star linebacker saying he was the victim of a scam. >> every single thing about this until that day in the first week of december was real to man tie. -- mantai. no suspicion that it wasn't. no belief that it might be. the pain was real, the grief was real, the affection was real and that is the nature of this sad, cruel game. >> reporter: however frequently during the season you could seetae yaw pointing to the heavens pointing to

the passed away grandmother and a girlfriend that never existed. there was that moment during the season when he inflated the relationship at least, referring to the girlfriend, lennay kakua who never existed and his grandmother saying, i'm going to see them again, having never seen her in the first place. he also said fighting back tears as he backed his star linebacker that he was the victim of a cruel hoax and a hoax executed on one of the most trusting people he had ever met, martha. martha: if it was a hoax, he elaborated on it, perhaps to fill in the blanks. perhaps he was embarrassed he was having an internet relationship. that is a possibility. he said he met her after a game in stanford in palo alto. his father said he also met her. that she came to hawaii, visited their family which is really a mind-bender. so he needs to explain obviously. are we learning anything about when we may hear from him, mike? >> reporter: yeah, it is interesting. he probably wouldn't be the

first college guy to have a girlfriend that nobody ever got around to meeting but in terms of hearing from the university, it seems that we've heard the last from the university unless there's a new development. te'o however, appears to be on his own. last we heard from him was a written statement. i will read you part of that. to realize i was the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke and constant lies was and is painful and humiliating. also being noted, martha, just about every major news organization, sports organization, ran with this tear jerking story of a linebacker triumphing through all of this grief and adversity. just about none of them even checked to see if an obituary was run. martha: the reporting was really shoddy on this story because there was no obituary. there was nothing at the funeral home. and the hospital that she claimed to be at you would have thought, when he was talking about visiting her at the hospital that the hospital might have said,

wait a minute. that is weird. that is not true. no one is here by that name. so, mike, thank you. lots to talk about. >> reporter: you got it. bill: certainly is. meanwhile on the campus of notre dame university there is only one story this morning and one topic of conversation. students shocked by the reports trying to work through it and figure out on their own. have a listen here. >> blows my mind because honestly doesn't make sense. >> i didn't think it was real. saw a lot of facebook updates about it. i thought, no way this could be happening. >> i was incredibly being showed but you could see why it is believable because, you know, if it is a hoax and he was getting tricked could have been a practical joke that got out of hand. >> i really hope that it's not true that he would have anything to do with it but i think it's unfortunate and embarrassing something like this would happen to him. bill: many of those students also appear to be withholding judgment until te'o speaks for himself but we don't know when that will happen. martha: meanwhile folks in

his small, close-knit hawaiian hometown are standing by him. he is a local hero in that town. went to the same high school as president obama. most of the neighbors say they don't believe he would have knowingly spread a story like this. >> he is a good kid and he never do anything like that. >> well, really shocked because we were watching him as he was being candidate for the heisman trophy. we just want otherses to know we know mantai, we know he would never do that. but whatever comes out we still love him. >> a lot of support for neighbors. nobody has answered the door so far at the family home. so no reaction from them at this point. we'll have more on this story that surrounds this bizarre situation. manti te'o's fake girlfriend

and the culture of football later this hour. social media needs to be discussed here. we'll talk to veteran sportscaster jim gray and a also have a panel on this coming up. bill: the most telling interview in all of this is what happened on espn on october 2nd of 2012. you listen to that interview. it is absolutely riveting to hear him describe his girlfriend and explain their relationship and the hours every night, night after night, that he spent with her on the other end of the telephone. how does all this work out? how does he explain it? martha: you know, they would breathe together basically throughout the night and helped her to come out of her coma. it is, i feel sad for him because obviously, you know, he was in deep into this story and, you know the question is, with so much success why? bill: one more note on this. the athletic director of notre dame had a press

conference last night. it was clear he was putting this all on te'o. so at some point he will have to talk and clarify this we have a lot more coming up because we're just getting going. a messy forecast for a lot of people who don't see snow. parts of dixie are digging out this morning. we said dixie in the southeast. martha: the national credit card is almost maxed out. there's the bill. anybody around who could pay that for us? that would be helpful. democrats say they think we should get rid of the debt ceiling all together because it is difficult to bum up against that. art laffer with thoughts on that. bill: will have a lot of thoughts. the nra responds in turn and the group's president will be here live for us this morning. >> we will nullify anything the president does that smacks of legislation. hey! did you know that honey nut cheerios

has oats that can help lower cholesterol? and it tastes good? sure does! wow. it's the honey, it makes it taste so... well, would you look at the time... what's the rush? be happy. be healthy. martha: so it is thursday. that means we get brand new jobs numbers from the labor

department. the number of americans seeking unemployment benefits fell by 37,000 last week. that is a seasonally adjusted number of 335,000 for unemployment. that is the lowest level since january of 2008, just before the recession began but this seemingly sharp improvement in the labor market may be a little bit misled leading. jobless numbers in january can be erratic. employers return to normal practices after laying off temporary workers hired for the holidays. you want to look at in terms of the long-time trend here and where it seems to be moving. this shows the job numbers since december of 2007. economists say the weekly claims number has to consistently fall below 375,000 as indicated by the yellow line. we've been bumping above and below it, hugging the yellow line since december of 2011 really. so that is the indication of how strong the jobs market really is. bill: what if we just did

not have a debt limit? that is what some house democrats are arguing. that's what they want to happen, pushing for a repeal of the federal debt ceiling in response to what they call republican blackmail. art laffer, architect of the reagan tax cuts in the 1980s. good morning to you. >> good morning, bill. i'm fine. bill: blackmail, what do you say? >> blackmail! i think part of the normal checks and balances in government. when the democrats have president and controlled of the senate they don't like republicans to control their spending when. republicans are in control, democrats don't like it. it is a tool used by congress to make sure that we have fair and balanced policy going forward. the one i love, bill, if you look at "the wall street journal" today they have barack obama's speech before the senate when bush was president. and how he was going to vote against raising the debt ceiling and he made this beautiful speech, all of which is perfectly correct. it just now he is on the opposite side of the equation. it is a silly argument. bill: he went on to explain as he has see things

differently as senator than president in the white house. >> of course you do. >> some conservatives argue this. i want to get your feeling on this. focus on the overspending. don't focus on the long-term debt. when you focus on the debt ceiling it makes the message more muddled and more difficult. do you agree a with that? >> that's correct. i really do. i think the debt ceiling is a beautiful tool to get the president and congress to agree and to compromise and work things out and to bring down spending. i think that is right. it shouldn't be used to close down the country. that is just another tool, another political compromise in negotiations and it is a beautiful tool for that to bring the two sides together to bring out something that is good for all of us. bill: jerry nadler, a congressman from here in new york. he was the one said it was being used for political blackmail. that is where the comment came from. the debt ceiling has been in place since 1939. you have competing ideas, one on the house, john boehner said we'll raise the

debt sealing a dollar for every dollar you cut spending. republicans out of pennsylvania, pat toomey you prioritize the bills you pay for long period of time. weeks and months. make sure the military is taken care of. >> sure. bill: would you back house idea or senate idea or neither? >> i think both are part of the negotiation strategy. i think john boehner's plan to bring down spending dollar for dollar makes a lot of sense and i think pat toomey's does. you don't want to cut very things most critical to the u.s. there is lot of garbage spending in government, believe me, bill, when i say that. why would you make the critical spending the first things you're going to cut except just to hold the country hostage. that is what the democrats are threatening. it doesn't make sense. bill: do you think republicans can win on either option? >> if they do it carefully, slowly and comfortably, yes i do think they can win. i think we can get major reform using the debt ceiling, slowly but surely.

don't make it a battle all at once. raise the debt ceiling two, three, four months and come back to see what things we can do to make america a better country. debt ceiling is forcing these people to compromise. bill: thank you, art. >> thank you, bill. bill: it will be bloody in washington, d.c. thank you, art out of nashville. >> thank you very much, bill. martha: it was an emergency landing. batteries melting down in midair. now the aircraft billed as the future of commercial aviation is really grounded at this point the nightmare for the boeing 787 dreamliner. bill: reclaiming a theater from the memry of a massacre. how some victims of the colorado shooting are healing today you but not forgetting about the man accused of killing 12. >> saw a lot of reports how he is crazy. don't make that mistake. he is not crazy. he is evil.

martha: grounded. the faa ordering an immediate halt to all flights of the boeing 787 dreamliner after an emergency landing and unexplained overheating batteries is the issue in this plane. dan springer is live in seattle. what is the immediate impact of all this, dan? >> reporter: martha, officially it is a crisis for boeing. canceled flights, upset passengers all across the world. within hours of the faa directive to ground all 787s, other countries followed suit. airlines are scrambling to get other aircraft to fill in for the dreamliners. in most case that is not possible. in san jose, two flights to tokyo have been canceled. two are in jeopardy. this nonstop route was opened friday to a lot of fanfare. the faa is grounding the 787 because of quote, a potential battery fire risk.

it was triggered by an emergency landing of a 787 in japan due to apparent overheatings of a battery, second time in eight years. business leaders who worked for years getting new flights to asia. they don't fault the airlines. they're upset with boeing. >> this is a company that put passengers ahead of profits and made a wise decision to make sure that boeing works out these kinks before they put another plane up in the air. >> reporter: and 49 dreamliners were in service. united airlines is the only american carrier to fly them. they have six, martha. martha: well, better safe than sorry. is what i would say obviously. it is a big pr issue for boeing but a safety issue for these passengers more than anything else. better they don't fly the planes until they figure out what is going on with them. dan, thank you very much. >> okay. bill: more questions now by the hour. the story of a notre dame star football player and the girlfriend who did not exist. was he duped, or was he in on it?

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the face of horrible horrible tragedy. here is te'o last october describing his girlfriend after her death. >> the possibly the most beautiful girl i have ever met. not because of physical beauty but the beauty of her character and who she is. she was just that person that i turned to and even though she was fighting lukemia and, you know, fighting various things, she always found time to serve someone else. martha: how about that? now it turns out it was a big hoax, or potentially that he knew bit and wanted to continue this story for whatever reason, and the belief is this girlfriend never existed. here are some of the outrage just claims he made on all of this during his interviews. that they met after a stanford game in 2009. you now you could buy into that, if you go with the hoax theory, you cosay well, maybe he was embarrassed

that he had this internet girlfriend, he wanted to say they met there. he also said they spoke regularly on the phone while she was sick in the hospital. sometimes his phone would have eight hour phone calls on it in the morning because when he would breathe and wake up and her hear breathing. he says her family believed he could help her through bad nights with her coma, okay? in early 2012, here's another wrinkle. te'o's father says that the girl visited his son in hawaii. so why would the father also substantiate these claims? te'o also claims that he received letters from her when she was suffer from lukemia, it goes on and on basically. let's bring in brian kilmeade, co-host of "fox and friends". dr. henry cloud is a clinical psychologist. we'll talk to him in just a moment. brian is in the middle of his radio show. we'll go to you first, brian. so many layers on this, brian. the question, the big headline question still, is whether or not it was a hoax as notre dame is saying. he is very vulnerable,

innoncent guy in his heart and he fell for this hook, line and sinker. or the other line of thinking he knew about it, perhaps he did it to publicize his career because it was a good story and he kept rolling with it. >> i don't know what is worth. but i do have a sense he is in on the hoax and thought he could pull it off, how did he get into notre dame? if he was a victim of hoax and going all the way to december 26th when he got a phone call from the phone number evidently his girlfriend didn't exist, used after being dead for three months, went up to december 26th. how did he have intellect to get into university of noteter dim and linebacker on the field that he is? i think this thing is really getting biz, sr. especially i thought we could agree on this that the woman didn't exist. one arizona cardinals full back said i met her before man tie met her. she was beautiful. had a athletic body like a volleyball player and was

polynesian. i thought she was a member of my family. really? a member of your family? the girl that didn't exist? in the deadspin story that broke the story, the sources reveal that they're 80% sure manti was in on it. martha: in facebook pictures spoke to them, deadspin said, that is me. the tuisopio, he asked she for a picture it. we went to high school together. she became the face of all this. unknowingly according to her. i want to get your take on the business side of this, brian. at the bottom of his statement he says i just want to focus on the nfl draft. what is the future forethis player given this whole incident? >> not nearly as good. top five pick, i don't think anymore. they go heavy into the psychological exams when you go into the nfl draft. what kind of leader are you? he was terrible after hiding the news on december 26th on the championship game. how did he handle it.

is it good for a guy to be this devious or naive? these are intangibles they look for top first, bottom first or top second. he lost millions. martha: cut you off for your own good. i know you have to get back to your show. brian, thank you very much. brian kilmeade in the middle of kill needs and friends. we want to talk about the psychology side of all of this. what's your take on it? >> there's a lot of psychology in this right, martha? either way you go, if it's a hoax upon him, then you've got to ask how in the world can you go that long with no pick in today's cell phone -- where are the thousands of pictures that would have been sent back and forth? for him to be that clueless speaks to some pretty significant fantasy life going on. you have to create a bunch of stuff in your head to believe this for that long. on the other side if he is part of the hoax probably what you've got is you have

got a guy that has a lot of talent but needing to create some sort of external persona to kind of manage it all and to look like he is in love and all this hero stuff. he needed some sort of a mask. either way it is not a good picture. martha: let's take a look. this tweet that we're going to pull up is said to be the original encounter between these two people. you can see it from his twitter account. and it goes to her's which was love, love, love, you. nice to meet you too, ma'am, he says in this one. that was supposed to be their very first interaction, october 2011. look at the quote he said. this was part of explaining why he wouldn't go to his girlfriend's funeral and how she told him he must play the game and he says, that this is a quote from her. babe, if anything happens to me you promise that you will stay there and that you will play and you'll honor me

through the way that you play. i mean, you know, it is shocking. i mean you could do analysis of reporters as well on this story. that why would these things. >> right. martha: when you look back, feels like so many red flags should have been raised to this. >> you know there are some people that otherwise, you know, that they have friends and high functioning all of that, but when it comes to this one area of romance, they have got all sorts of insecurities, et cetera and they will build fantasy lives around very small things. and that is really, really possible here. however, we see a guy that is well-integrated into a lot of community and relationships and high functioning and to think that kind of a fantasy could be sustained beginning off of a little tweet or the other account is, they just spotted each other in, i think 09. you know, it takes some reaching to believe that.

martha: there's got to be some reason why that would happen. you know he claims it was a hoax. that he is embarrassed and humiliated. he fell for it. we do know there are tons of people online, kids have the fake relationships with internet people. >> sure. martha: that don't exist. they try to find them and can't find them because they're not the picture they put out there. it is a crazy comment where we are today. dr. cloud, thank you. quickly. >> if you have a long relationship and she has lukemia, don't you make some contact and go back there or there's a picture somewhere in the picture? martha: dr. cloud, thank you very much. good to have you us. bill: who can you believe these days? lance armstrong will reveal everything to oprah or will he tonight? wow! there is new fallout from budget uncertainty in washington. some private businesses that serve our troops and employ thousands being forced to cut their ranges. we'll -- ranks. we'll explain why. martha: new reaction to president obama's sweeping

plan to overhaul gun laws. the nra is calling this, quote, the fight of the century. that group's president will be with us in "america's newsroom." that is coming up. some republican lawmakers are gearing up for the defense of the second amendment. >> there are several of the executive orders that appear as if he is writing new law. that can not happen. we struck down once, the court struck clinton down for trying this and i'm afraid that president obama may have this king complex sort of developing. we're going to make sure that it doesn't happen. this is $100,000.

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progress-oh! -oh! -oh! oh! oh! ♪ wh do you know? oh! ♪ bacon? -oh! -oh! oh! [ female announcer ] with 40 delicious progresso soups at 100 calories or less, there are plenty of reasons people are saying "progress-oh!" share your story for a chance to win a progress-oh! makeover in hollywood. go to facebook.com/progresso to enter. martha: all right. i will start with the words of our reporter jennifer griffin who says in her latest reporting on this situation on the ground in algeria that this is a flui situation. we have to be very cautious about how we report this because we know that there were dozens of hostages. some of whom escaped possibly. an american among those who escaped. but we're also learning that there was chaos, truly that

ensued when the algerian military who has surrounded this facility attacked with helicopter gunships according to jennifer griffin around 7:00 a.m. eastern this morning according to a military source. we're hearing reports that people were killed in the helicopter attack by the algerian military. jennifer points out there is no u.s. military involved in this effort at all. that they are in the closest area in stuttgart as they observe what is going on in algeria. more on that coming. bill: now at home, the nra calls it, quote, the fight of the century, responding to president obama's new push for sweeping changes in our nation's gun laws. reaching out to the nra four million members, executive vice president wayne lapierre writing quote, i warned you this day was coming, now it is here. it is not about protecting your children. it is not about stopping crime. it is about banning guns period. david king, president of the national rifle association.

sir, welcome back here. >> pleasure to be with you. bill: to "america's newsroom." this is the first chance we had a chance to talk to you since the president put forward yesterday. what do you think about what is happening in washington? >> we're dispointed but not surprised. the fact is this announcement by the president was less about protecting our children but using our children to promote anti-gun agenda, an agenda he had for most of his political life. so it doesn't surprise us. we went to the vice president earlier a meeting said would be open-ended and open-minded. when we got there vice president reminded people in the room that he and the president had strong feelings about firearms and they would pursue that agenda. we knew they would do that. we knew it was all show. we talked to nra too. we got what we expected. bill: to that end, do you believe their minds were made up on what proposals they would pursue? >> sure they were. bill: what does it mean then, the fight of the century?

define that. >> when you get into a battle in congress or in a battle generally over something as fundamental as the right to keep and air arms under the constitution, where the president, who says, that he is going to devote as much political capital as necessary to achieve his goals, that's a big fight. this is going to be a big fight. we've been through this before and we're happy that it he is going to be debated with the public because we think the public in the end, i always operated under the assumption that members of the public are smarter than the politicians anyway but when this debate is finished, i'm convinced that we're not going to be as badly off as the president would like to see. bill: that is interesting. i want to talk a few things here quickly about an ad that was released. you heard jay carney. had strong reaction what came out. a lot of people had strong reaction to it. what carney said from the white house yesterday is this. to go so far as to make the president's safety of the president's children the subject of an attacked a is

repugnant and cowardly. >> it would be if that is what we did. it would be if that is what we did. that's not what we did. what we did was make a very legitimate point. that is, that the not just the president's kids but the kids of elites attend schools where there is security. and yet many of those people deride the idea that security is something that other people's children should have. this is a country in which we should be concerned about protecting all the kids. of course the president's kids deserve protection and they're special which is why they have secret service which isn't what we were talking about. we were talking about --. bill: that was not out of bounds, right. >> no, we do not think so. we think it was a valid point and continue to make it. bill: some of the executive orders, many of them, 23. here is one of them which goes to doctors in america and what they can and can not report to police. we'll show you on the screen as well now. clarify that no federal law prohibits doctors or other health care providers from

contacting authorities when patients threaten to use violence. that goes to the whole mental health aspect. you remember what the president said from the outset, we want to make sure sandy hook never happens again. would i oppose that executive order or support it? >> we would certainly report supporting threats of violence but that's not what previous administrations have done and it is not what we fear he is going to do. the idea that your doctor would ask you if you have firearms in your house, as part of an examination of your health, is repugnant because you have a right under the second amendment to own firearms legitimately. if the president wants a doctor to report a threat of physical violence, a citizen should do that as well as a doctor. but if what they want doctors to do is what they urged doctors to do in the past which help them demonize firearms by asking their patients if they have guns and implying that

owning a gun is a health problem, then we're opposed to it. bill: we'll bring you back. there is a lot more on the executive orders that we need to get to. we'll sort through them one by one. david keane, thank you for your time. >> anytime. bill: a lot of e-mails on this. a lot of tweets on this. hemmer@foxnews.com is the e-mail. on twitter @billhemmer, because you asked, bya. want to talk about what was announced yesterday. second amendment, this debate will continue for some time and we'll see what if anything passes in congress. martha: we sure will. hot topic and it continues. how about this, it is not hot at all. we're bracing for a winter wallop of cold, a messy storm taking aim at towns and places really not iced to snow and ice. so head's up on this storm, folks. we'll get you the latest from the fox weather center. bill: a bit of a wild scheme to hunt burmese pythons in florida. wait until you hear who is about to join that

challenge. martha: it ain't me. bill: it ain't me either. ♪ . ÷÷

bill: shopping for a pair of snakeskin boots, are you? join senator bill nelson in the hunt for burmese pythons in the florida everglades. that state is sponsoring the python challenge to bring down the exploding python population. the snakes are an invasive species in florida with no natural predators. said to be decimatings indigenous wildlife. more than a thousand, a thousand hunters, signed up already. >> new fallout over the battle for budget cuts. there is uncertainty in washington. it is forcing defense related businesses to cut back. some saying they're already

losing contracts. jonathan serrie live on this story for us today from atlanta, georgia. hi, jonathan. >> reporter: good morning, martha. the big problem here is sequestration. although congress has delayed the automatic spending cuts until march, they have not delayed the uncertainty surrounding defense funding. watch. just miles from fort bragg, k-2 solutions trains dogs for police and military use. and provides research and development for equipment and weaponry. but the status of new defense contracts is unclear for this company that employs 274. >> in the past seven months we submitted eight proposals. two of them have been canceled. the other ones are in limbo for up to eight months. >> reporter: this disabled army veteran is ceo of a small company that markets facial recognition technology. >> we late last fall got turned down for funding twice because they said working for the federal government was too unstable.

>> reporter: some companies can survive by marketing that irservices to a wide range of civilian needs. k2 trains these dogs to find virtually any type of object, in virtually any type of environment. >> k2 solutions is growing. >> reporter: contractors with more military-specific roles are embracing for worst case scenarios. >> wondering how are they going to survive, how they will be impacted. some are already having to take measures to lay people off. >> reporter: even though everyone is talking about march, this is a problem that is already affecting companies of all sizes right now. martha? martha: sure sounds like it. jonathan, thank you very much. bill: how about that that every glades deal. wading in the dark of the florida everglades. trying to find a python? go get them, phil. we're getting breaking developments what is happening oversees on this hostage matter.

it has gone to a new level. jennifer griffin live at the pentagon what we can report what is happening there now. we'll also ask the question is al qaeda emboldened because of benghazi? john bolton, the ambassador, on that. martha: good question. plus the american pastor facing a judge now in iran because he is a christian. we're going to tell but the legal fight ahead and his run-in that is coming with the hanging judge.

martha: fox news alert. breaking news for american hostages held captive by al qaeda terrorists. we're getting reports now that americans may be among the hostages that have escaped. we don't know if there are still americans being held there. there's a lot of very fluid situation going on here. it is from a natural gas plant in the african nation of algeria where al qaeda-linked militants stormed that facility yesterday taking dozens captive. we're also hearing of an

airstrike by the algerian military that may have led to the death of some hostages. so this is a very big story and that is how we're starting this next hour of "america's newsroom." i'm martha maccallum. bill: i'm bill hemmer. good morning again. we're monitoring this closely. right now the facility said to be surrounded by the algerian army. there is an ongoing operation at the site. jennifer griffin is at the pentagon. she has been working through this with us trying to report what we can, what we can confirm. jennifer, good morning. what have you pieced together? >> reporter: good morning, bill. what we can say for certain that everything changed at about 7:00 a.m. eastern. that is when the algerian military opened fire. we understand they fired from helicopter gunships on some of the hostage-takers as they were trying to leave the facility. there are reports from a militant spokesman, one of the hostage takers spokesmen, has told local press reports out in the region that 35 of the hostages were killed and

that seven are still being held by the hostage-takers. two of them americans. we can not confirm that with u.s. sources at this point in time. in fact the situation has gotten very murky and the agencies in the united states which monitor this situation are not clear themselves what has happened at this time. i can report from conversations i had very early this morning that at least one american escaped from this facility and was able, was in touch with his family. so there were some americans who escaped but it is also not clear whether those were americans who were held by the hostages or who were elsewhere at the facility and managed to get out. so again, this is developing as we speak. what we do know is there appears to have been a firefight, a gunfight at about 7:00 a.m. eastern and there do seem to be casualties from that and it is also possible that some americans are still being held by the hostage-takers. be pointed out that the algerian

military has a history of battling islamists in its own country. what's not clear is whether these islamists came from algeria or neighboring libya or perhaps from mali, that situation to the south. and i'm not sure quite at the moment rather, how much that matters. but there was --. >> reporter: bill, actually, go ahead i think we have a little bit of clarity who the hostage-taker is and his movements. he is aler. >>ian jihadist. he is in his 40s. he fought in afghanistan. lost an eye there. he broke away from the group aqim, al qaeda in the maghreb last october. he has a splinter group that went to fight in mali where the french over the weekend began a operation against al qaeda. he had fighters early on in the mali conflict. then we're told by, by releases by the, you know, from the hostage-takers themselves that they crossed into algeria to this bp gas

facility. it's about 20 miles from the libyan border, and they took the hostages in protest against algeria supporting the french airstrikes on northern mali. so it's all interrelated and it is all very significant development. bill: great clarification, jennifer. when you get more come back. from the pentagon, jennifer griffin. martha? martha: a spate of recent terror attacks raising serious concerns whether terrorists are emboldened after the lack of reaction to the attack in benghazi. four americans were murdered on september 11th, including our u.s. ambassador. not one suspect has been charged in this case. the one that was released. here is charles krauthamer talking about this last night on "special report". >> we had the benghazi attack. we thought it was an outlyer. essentially it is the same people, the same affiliated groups and the groups in the region saw that complete lack of response, any

seriousness by the united states about the benghazi attack. about the leading suspect in the attack, going openly in the streets of benghazi. martha: strong words last night from charles krauthamer. joined by john bolton, former u.s. ambassador to the u.n. and fox news contributor. ambassador, good morning. what do you think about what charles krauthamer had to say there? >> there is much to be said for it. we don't know the specifics about this hostage taking in algeria and whether in fact it is a direct response to the french intervention in mali but in the bigger picture the notion that there is widespread terrorist activity, there are a lot of terrorist groups, they are loosely coordinated, loosely affiliated but all share the same objective radical islamic regimes replacing existing arab regimes and threatening the west i think is very much in evidence. i think the fact it has been over four months since the

attack on benghazi, four americans murdered, no visible american response, has to say to people, given everything else that president obama has said for four years about his view of the muslim world and the war on terror, that they are much safer, much more likely to decide to use force to take hostages than in previous years. and i think we're seeing the evidence of it right now. martha: yeah. president obama was emphatic about the fact that he suggested this would be done, those killers would be tracked down from the benghazi raid that killed four americans. that has not happened. as we pointed out. your mind goes back to other events in the past in terms of retaliation like the uss cole for example. like the bombing at the world trade center in 1993 which we know was followed the up, you said it many times on this program, you know, they have got a lot of patience and they have a lot of time f they feel there is

an opening and a window, al qaeda proved to us time and time again they will continue to strike. >> that's why this attack on a natural gas facility in algeria is significant. this is a direct attack on a critical element of algeria's economy. i think as bill said a moment ago, the islamists have been present in algeria for some time. 20 years ago they won the elections there. the military had to come in to take over the government to prevent them from assuming power. this phenomenon didn't happen overnight. it has been building in the arab world. rise of fundamentalist islam, the rise of radical politicized islam. we've seen its manifestation in a number of different ways including al qaeda. but it is broad and it's deep and the idea we can simply say as we've done the past four years the on terror is over, al qaeda is defeated, we don't have to worry about it, we can cut our defense budget without limit, we're seeing right now, right in front of us the danger of this kind of

thinking. martha: what should we do? you know, if americans are still being held and this is a very fuzzy situation right now what should the reaction be? >> i think we need to get some clarity what's going on the ground but i think what it also shows you can't wait for this kind of event to happen before you plan in advance. i think we blindsided by the attack in benghazi, by the attacks on our other embassies. we should have plans in place where there are americans, private citizens, we're talking about here that our government should protect just as much as our official representatives in case this happened. and there is just no evidence to me, it should be a subject for congressional inquiry, what plans the administration has, contingency plans when this sort of hostage-taking takes place. but more broadly this is a problem of a fundamental failure of conceptualization of what the issue is with the rise and the growth of islamic terrorism. this is not a law enforcement question. this is not something to be dealt with now by an fbi

investigation. this is a war against the united states, against the west, against arab regimes, that are not radical islamists. until we act on that basis, which he had been after our first 9/11 attack we're not going to be able to cope with it effectively. it will grow and continue to threaten us. martha: you've been saying that all along. john bolton, thank you very much. good to have you here. >> thank you, martha. martha: all right. bill: when we get more we'll pass it to you. that's what we have for now. meantime new violence erupting in iraq, insurgents unleashing a string of bomb attacks in the country, killing at least 22, and extending a wave of deadly blood shed into second day. the attacks targeted mainly shiite pilgrims. violence has risen across iraq. they attack security forces, shiite pilgrims in an attempt to undermined the country's shiite-led government. in this country, extreme weather alert as normally warm locations get ready for

a bit irbrush with a messy winter storm that could bring heavy snow to areas that often go without a single flake for an entire year. janice dean is on that in our fox extreme weather center. janice. >> they're building snowmen, southern snowmen in mississippi. parts of mississippi seeing more snow than chicago. it's crazy. look at that snow. it is just about ending for jackson but moving northward into meridian, up towards oxford, mississippi, tupelo, and this will continue up towards tennessee and alabama. we could see several inches of snow before all said and done. throughout the morning we'll see icy travel unfortunately, bad time to be on the roadways. stay at home. make those southern snowmen, those southern snow angels. be safe. i'm sure the kids are loving it. heading into tonight and overnight, the mid-atlantic region, the southern appalachians you will see the biggest amount of snow totals, six to 12 inches. let's look at the travel forecast.

thursday 1:00, watching snow move into alabama and tennessee. temperatures dropping as it continues to move north and eastward, seeing that snow move along the appalachians into north carolina and virginia. the temperatures will drop and the snow will start to fly. in some cases one to four, even six inches of snow. as you see as the storm exits the temperatures are going to drop, drop like a rock. in some cases below freezing. 29 for you in norfolk. 31 in d.c. it will be a cold inauguration day heading into next week. so there is the precipitation accumulation. one to four inches across dixie. in some cases you don't see that. it is a pretty rare event. once every several years. then you will see more accumulation as you head up into the higher elevations of the mountains, appalachians, six to 12, maybe, 18 inches of snow. pretty incredible. here in the northeast, we don't get any. martha likes the snow. martha: i do. bill: they're getting

everything. we're not. >> we have to go to mississippi!. bill: there is still time. >> you're absolutely right. bill: stay tuned. thank you. martha: folks in pennsylvania are also getting a rude winter awakening as they find local highways completely covered with snow before sunrise. these were apparently no ordinary water flakes. >> very heavy because of water content in it. extra three or four inches on top of what you got. have to be very careful removing the snow because it is heavy and it is a back breaker. martha: that is the kind that will strain your back for sure. a few inches of that back breaking slush forced one truck to be hauled off the highway. multiple crashes reported throughout the morning commute. rough, rough going. you have to be careful. bill: in south you get black ice where you can not see the sheet of ice on the road and your car hits it and you can't do anything. a sports story that shocked country and.

new reports of dying girlfriend of the star linebacker at notre dame never had cancer. in fact she never existed s manti te'o the victim of a elaborate hoax or is he part of it? >> i want to stress, as someone who has probably been as engaged in this as anyone, in the past couple of weeks, that nothing about what i have learned has shaken my faith in manti te'o one iota. bill: that is athletic director of notre dame last night. he met with te'o late december and early this month. veteran sportscaster jim gray on the scandal and the questions that have not been answered. >> we'll see what he has to say about it. republican lawmakers attacking president obama for going after the second amendment they say. are the president's executive orders nothing more than a power grab? we'll have a fair and balanced discussion about all of that. bill: remember this from yesterday? dramatic rescue. we watched it unfold here in "america's newsroom." today

we talk to the man who was right in the middle of it all bringing her to safety. >> she was in good spirits. cold obviously. she is up against two cold pieces of concrete. but, no, just assured her we were doing everything we could to get her out and get her out as soon as possible. we weren't going home without her. that was it. etables it's easy to eat like a giant... ♪ and feel like a green giant. ♪ ho ho ho ♪ green giant

martha: well a dangerous situation for firefighters after a propane tank goes up in flames in a small explosion but threatened to create a bigger blast in those flames can not be contained the initial explosion apparently happened while firefighters were already dousing the tank behind this warehouse in nashville, tennessee. no injuries were reported in that situation so far. bill: republican lawmakers criticizing president obama for attacking the second amendment with the sweeping new gun control proposals they say released yesterday. republican senator marco rubio says the newt town shooting gave mr. obama the political footing he needed

to take on gun rights in america. here is with bill o'reilly on the factor last night. >> i think this is what he wanted to do with his entire political career. he uses opportunity to do it and use every rhetorical device to do it. >> does he think banning assault weapons will stop mass murder? >> i think he believes that. the president doesn't have guts to say it doesn't believe in the second amendment. the second amendment is in the constitution. i didn't write the constitution. neither did you. neither did he. if he doesn't want the second amendment to be in the constitution have the guts to admit that. bill: there is lot of reaction. monica crowley, radio talk show host, doug cone, former advisor to president bill clinton. morning to both of you. what do you think about what senator rubio said about the president and second amendment. >> there is lot of wariness and caution on the republican side. they are worried this may be the beginning of a fall on

assault on the second amendment. i think senator rubio is correct in his heart the president is not a big fan of the second amendment, never has been. you will recall, bill, president obama's first chief of staff, rahm emanuel once said, never let a crisis go to waste. newtown and aurora, certainly were crises. and i think they're being leveraged by this white house to at least begin an assault on the second amendment. essentially what the president did was sign these 23 executive actions yesterday and pass it off to congress, the outstanding question of of course is hough much this can actually get through congress. bill: you're right about that. come back to the original, question, doug. what do you think about the second amendment? >> i think the president made it very clear yesterday that he supports the second amendment. i think to talk about reasonable controls on assault weapons, high-capacity magazines, and universal background checks makes sense and to do relatively noncontroversial actions through executive

orders like enforcing existing laws. allowing the cdc to study the root causes of gun violence makes exact and good sense. i think this is just a shiboleth from the right to try to resist reasonable gun violence prevention. bill: what they're saying this is executive power grab. >> i don't think so. bill: go back 31 days when the president went to newtown. he said we're going to try to prevent this from ever happening again. all the measures we take will go toward that. monica, based on what we saw yesterday on the proposals, whether the 23 executive orders, or the push that will go through congress, does that satisfy you and what we know about sandy hook and in preventing it from haing again? >> what we do know is that nothing he proposed yesterday would have prevented the tragedy at sandy hook. bill: nothing? >> no. look, good intentions don't necessarily make good law. what we saw in sandy hook is that the gun control laws, the existing laws in

connecticut, federal laws did kick in. adam lanza tried to buy some weapons and he was turned down because he didn't want to go through the waiting period and didn't want to go through the he got his hands on those weapons any way. a determined killer will do that regardless how many laws you have on the books. i don't think people are opposed to reasonable gun control. i think the concern here you now start down a very slippery slope where you're chipping away at the second amendment. you're chipping away at the essential freedoms guaranteed to law-abiding citizens in this country. that is the major concern. bill: let me bring in doug on this. do you believe anything on the table now would have prevented sandy hook? monica clearly does not. what do you think?. >> i would disagree with her. high-capacity magazines which were used in the guns that adam lanza deployed, if they were absolutely barred it would have meant there would have been less violence done, probably less kids killed. i think these are reasonable restrictions. monica you joined with me in

supporting enhanced universal background checks anytime a gun is sold privately there has to be a background check, that is reasonable? isn't it? >> that my concern that the federal government has a massive giant database of every law-abiding citizen owns the gun. >> precisely. >> problem is not law-abiding persons buying guns illegally. it is criminals. you need a database on criminals. >> exactly. that is one of the executive orders. i'm glad we're in agreement. >> the background checks in place now i don't have a problem with. i have a problem with universal background check where the federal government amasses incredible amounts of information on law-abiding citizens. bill: we'll see what goes through congress and what does not. i appreciate the debate from both of. >> thank you, bill. bill: well-thought out. monica, doug, see you next week. look forward to it. martha. martha: there are growing concerns over america's commitment to the fight for religious freedom as a christian u.s. pastor, american citizen in iran, is

getting ready next week to face iran's notorious hanging judge. just because he is a christian and he is getting little help, he says, from the white house. bill: also being buried alive, it is a nightmare, right? i mean, come on, think about that. think of one woman surviving thanks to the help of her quick-thinking boyfriend. >> it was like i was having a little nap, and i remember being woken up by sweet kisses. ♪

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martha: flue concerns today, serious ones, about an american pastor stuck in a jail sell in iran. the concern is he could be hanged as a result of his upcoming trial. he faces several national security charges. many believe he was arrested for his christian faith.

a lot of ambiguity about why they took him in the first place. president obama declared wednesday religious freedom day in this country but just one day earlier the white house appeared to say very little, if anything really about this pastor's case in iran. >> has the president been kept apprised his situation? he is supposed to be going before iran's quote, unquote, hanging judge? do you have a statement on this case? >> i don't have a statement. i will have to take the question, the president is obviously updated on a variety of issues with regards to iran but i don't have anything specific for you on that. martha: not really a whole lot there. joined by jordan sekulow, executive director for the american center of law and justice. good to have you here this morning, jordan. in your piece you talk about religious freedom day. president obama said we remember religious liberty is not just an american human right it is liberty to

protected here at home and across the globe of the why is the white house not more involved in this case? >> i think it is outrage just what we've seen from the state department so far. we held back on the criticism because we know it takes time for the executive branch of u.s. government handling all the different issues. they have had since july. we started representing pastor saeed when ripped off a bus. we represented him within 48 hours. they to the a call, to his wife been on fox news in the united states that they couldn't do anything. until last week when the media pressure and attention really turned up because of this hanging judge that was ounce noed. he is sanctioned by the european union. our own u.s. commission on international religious freedom said he should be sanctioned. until that happened and we got this letter from the pastor from jail saying he was beat and tortured every day, until that happened the state department acted like they couldn't do anything. suddenly with all the media

attention they called his wife, okay, now we'll try to help. except, it is thursday, and his trial is on monday. and we didn't find out that until last monday. we heard nothing else from them. we don't know what they're doing. whether it is back channel, it would be nice to know if they're actually trying. martha: you make a great point. time is running out. just by way the background on his story, he was in iran, had been back and forth all the time over the years. has family there. his wife and children as you see. we showed pictures of them at disneyland. they're here in the united states. he is an american citizen. but he was leading house churches which they didn't like in iran. i won't do that anymore but setting up an orphannage in iran. that was his mission as he went back and forth. why, why did they take him in all of sudden for no apparent reason? >> well, they have now decided in iran to let the revolutionary guard treat christians, all christians as enemies of state. regardless of previous agreements. he was there setting up a nonsectarian or fannage. it was 80% done.

they have seized 100,000 of u.s. dollars used for the or fannage. that is why he was on the trip. working with the iranian government. doesn't sound like a dissident to get his or fannage approved. we have 49 members of the congress, 37 members of the house of representatives. we added a new senator to the letter to hillary clinton. ted cruz just signed, senator cruz from texas. they're demanding her to call for his release before the trial monday. the clock, as you said the clock's ticking. >> we'll stay on this. jordan, thank you so much for the update. best of luck to you with this. >> thanks, martha. bill: let's get him home. the star football player at notre dame, the girlfriend he said died of lukemia is someone he never actually met. what questions does he and notre dame have to answer today? martha: new fallout over president obama's gun control announcement. one sheriff says that he in his town, he has got no plans to enforce any of those rules.

can he do that? he joins us live. >> it all started because my deputies and i were getting questions from folks out there in the community just wanting to know, my position was. so...how'd it go? well, dad, i spent my childhood living with monks learning the art of dealmaking. you've mastered monkey-style kung fu? no. priceline is different now. you don't even have to bid. master hahn taught you all that? oh, and he says to say (translated from cantonese) "you still owe him five bucks." your accent needs a little work.

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bill: you may be like a lot of people waking up today wondering about the questions left over in the manti te'o hoax.

what did notre dame about it and what about the player. they said last night, through the athletic director that he was the victim. >> any ways, manti was the perfect mark, because he is a guy who is so willing to believe in others, and so ready to help, that as this hoax played out in a way that called upon those ten tkapb tendencies of manti and roped him more and more into a trap. bill: we went back to an interview with espn three months ago. jim gray, sportscaster and fox news contributor. good morning to you, jim. i want to push the store row forward in the following sense, there are questions for the school and questions for the player. what questions do you have that you believe notre dame has to answer to today? >> well, how did they let this go on?

they say that they were informed, the athletic director on december 26th. when they were informed why didn't they inform the public? why didn't they let the national championship game be played almost a couple weeks later against alabama under this disguise and guise that he was still playing for a woman who never existed that supposedly had deceased? why didn't they let everybody know that this was a bad fairy tale and it wasn't true. that's for them. i don't know why they didn't. bill: i got the impression listening to the athletic director last night, he's putting a lot of this on te'o, suggesting that he has to provide answers to the public, if not the school and all the fans some time very soon. i want to take you back to october 2nd. this is an interview that aired at great length on espn. this too i find riveting. i want to let's even t listen to it then we'll talk about him. >> if you have someone you talk to every single day, that you

sleep with on the phone, she's going through a lot of things and the only way she can sleep is if you're on the other side of the phone. and you do that every single night for the last four months, and suddenly it's silence. dead silence really eats at you. it's eating at me and it continues to eat at me, but, you know, that's where faith comes in. bill: he went on and on and on in that interview. what questions does he have to answer? how does he do it? where do you start? >> well, you can't make this stuff up, but somebody did. i guess where you start is he said he met her in 200 the. it would be interesting to know what woman did he meet if in fact he met every woman. he said when she died that it was the most beautiful person he had ever met. now he's ep embarrassed he only had an online relationship. by releasing the statement he

released he is causing a whole lot more questions to be answered. notre dame says he's a victim. there are a lot of people out there that wanted to believe he is a victim. perhaps he is in fact a victim. if he is a victim it seems to me he did an awful lot of things throughout the course of this that were very naive and probably out right stupid, because in this day and age of skype and face time and so and and so forth he may have been caught in a hoax, then he embellished it and it got away from him and he's embarrassed. there are so many questions he has to answer and i don't know that there will be any good answers to this. bill. bill: you mentioned the date december 26th. that is significant. because that was the day he approached his head coach and his defensive coordinator and said, the woman i thought was my girlfriend never existed. then it went from there. yet a national championship game was played 11 or 12 days later. te'o came out with a statement last night.

it's a long one. we maintained what i thought to be an authentic relationship by communicating frequently online and on the phone and i grew to care deeply about her. to realize that i was the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke and constant lies was and is painful and humiliating. i wonder if you have to give him the benefit of the doubt until he explains all this? and then i think about lanceandw that will go national tonight and oprah winfrey, and you start to think about the pressure, the culture of sports. you wonder how that comes into play, and i don't know, have you thought about that? can you make a connection? or is this still so early in the confusion stage right now for this situation at notre dame? >> well, he was a good enough player that he didn't have to do any of this. he didn't have to embellish his story. he was playing for notre dame. they were on their way to be playing for a national championship. he created this so long ago. so if he was involved with this there was no reason for it.

he makes himself look better and more of a sympathetic figure for what? he can play the game, and it's going to cost him now because people are going to wonder, you know, either his credibility is severely at stake here because he's been part of this whole thing or they they are going to wonder how he could have been tkaoubd into something for so long. so many questions, to never meet the woman but have this type of relationship. as far as the pressures i don't buy that, i don't believe it. lance armstrong perpetuated and committed the greatest fraud in the history of sports. any of the consequences that come his way he has to suffer. there has to be consequences for action. i don't believe in the pressures of sport. i just don't buy that, bill, nobody is putting a gun to these guys heads. i know this is a bad metaphor in this day and stage, and i'm sorry i said it. no one is forcing these guys or tpweugs these guys' arms to play sports. they do it because they want to and the pursuit of excellence.

i don't see a reason to lie, deceit. people are lying on their resumes all the time, bill. bill: if you have not followed the story throughout the last football season. notre dame played 12-0 played for the national championship and they had their shot against alabama. they blew it, they got blown-out in that game. te'o and his girlfriend was something that nbc and everyone talked about more months. i appreciate your thoughts. out of los angeles today, jim gray, veteran sportscaster. thank you, 21 minutes before the hour. martha. martha: well there is new fallout today from president obama's sweeping gun control package. in just minutes we'll speak to the sheriff who calls the president's proposal unconstitutional and he says at his level in his community he will not enforce these laws. bill: see that, that is an suv

in a pool. martha: that is a bad day. bill: with a man trapped inside. the driver was inside the suv underwater. new pictures and a dramatic rest rescue in a moment.

bill: there is a woman out of utah sharing her amazing story of survival. she was swallowed up by a massive avalanche. elizabeth malloy was back country skiing with a friend when the snow gave way. he landed above the snow, she was trapped underneath and unable to move, and that is heavy stuff too. malloy had a pocket of air an and avalanche beacon. her friend used it to find her and ultimately dig her out. >> i was flailing, yes. i was swimming. i decided the best situation for

me is to meditate and breath really slow. >> i immediately picked up the season, again that reaffirmed that she was buried somewhere. she had begun to turn purple. i did my best to clear out an area for her to breathe. bill: that is the way you do it. malloy is now out of the hospital and doctors expect her to make a full recovery, and she says she will continue her back country skiing. martha: she is a back country skiing kind of gal. we wish her well. how about this story, an oregon sheriff now saying that he will not enforce president obama's new gun control recommendations, and turns out he's not alone out there. at least ten states now say that they are considering taking some sort of legislative action against the federal government, those states span the nation from oregon all the way to south carolina. many sheriffs are now calling for action, like lynn county oregon sheriff tim mueller.

sheriff, welcome. good to have you here today. >> good morning, martha. martha: talk to me a little bit about your process of thinking this through. when you started to hear about the executive orders coming down from the president, what kind of action did you take? what became your plan, and how do you back up your ability to carry that out? >> well, when -- how it first started was is i had a lot of folks in my county asking myself and my deputies, you know, what my position was on if any, what they term far reaching or overreaching gun control laws were established from the feds. i made my position known. i told my deputies that i didn't support anything -- any regulations that would infringe upon the constitutional rights of our citizens. and more and more questions came out, as far as, you know, what my position was. i didn't see really a lot of information coming out of the

committee that vice president biden was sitting on, and so i just wanted to reach out to my own citizens in my county and let them know what my position was. and while i was working on doing that i thought well, you know, he's a chairman of the committee, and i didn't really see a lot of western sheriffs out being asked on what we thought, and specifically, you know, pacific northwest, we're from here, and so i decided i'd send him a letter and just let him know what my position was here in lynn county oregon and try to be as respectful as possible and still get my point made, and didn't really expect the attention that it got. i figured i might get some local attention. i tried to reach out through our local newspaper, and then we put it on our -- the copy of the letter that i wrote on our sheriff's office facebook pag

page -- martha: and then it's like wildfire. >> yeah. martha: what is your understanding of your jurisdiction, and sort of what you are allowed to do under the law, and what you are not beholding to in terms of these federal regulations? >> well, you know, i'm not so sure it's what i said but how i said it in that letter. you know, we don't enforce federal law anyway. we are not required to do it. we are actually prohibited from doing in it most cases. and a good example is federal immigration law. we are prohibited from enforcing that. martha: right. >> i don't think it's reasonable for anyone to think i'm going to enforce federal gun laws in my county. martha: i guess one question, you know, for you would be, if something were to happen in your community, and it looked like one of these laws or changes might have prevented that person from having access to a firearm, how would you deal with that?

>> if it's -- the lynn county sheriff's office, myself and my deputies have the position we are not going to enforce that law. it's a federal law. if it comes down as a state law then we'll have to revisit that. but we won't enforce federal regulations or federal laws. we are not required to, there is a separation of powers, and we won't. martha: all right. sheriff, thank you. this is getting a lot of attention and a lot of folks are getting on board with you. thank you, sir. >> you bet, glad to be here, thank you. bill: 12 minutes before the hour. jenna lee is standing by hospitals rolling our way. how are you doing, jenna good morning. jenna: what a week in the world of sports. this bombshell from the world of college football, the sad, strange tale of manti te'o. al-qaida takes hostages including americans. now we get word that some of the hostages have escaped, others have been killed. it's a very fluid situation.

we have live exclusive reporting ahead. plus our hardest hitting story of the day, bill is the foot long sandwich a myth? "happening now" takes on the hero mystery consuming new york. bill: because we want to know, all right? jenna: i know it keeps you up at night. bill: i'm telling you. jenna: we got it for you. bill: thank you, jenna. let out your ruler. in a moment here the woman in the wall today is free. martha: the woman in the wall. bill: remember this yesterday? martha: oh, yes, i remember. bill: one of her rescuers is going to join us on some of the creative things they had to do to get her to freedom. check her out. >> what were some of the things you did to help keep her warm? >> we actually use aide propane heater with a long tube. he we have some equipment that is especially designed for situations like this. it shoots warm out down to her to keep her warm. [ woman ] ring. ring. progresso.

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martha: a good samaritan is credited with saving a woman's live in california after her suv went head first into a swimming pool. no small suv, it was almost completely submerged. police say that the 69-year-old driver was still trapped inside when the man pulled the suv to the side of the pool by its roof rack, dragged her out of the window and the driver apparently had missed a turn before driving through a wrought iron fence. she is shaken up, no, doubt bics pebgted to b, but expected to be just fine. then there's that. bill: a woman freed after spending hours wedged in between two walls is now out of the hospital. that dramatic rescue played out live in "america's newsroom" yesterday morning at this hour. she had 8 inches of room between those walls. at least 22 firefighters worked to get her free, and one of them is rich chapman, portland fire department lieutenant. lieutenant, good morning to

you. just another day on the job, wasn't it? >> i don't know if i could say it was just another day. it was a good one, though. bill: you are a sport. since that story happened, lieutenant, the one question that everyone keeps on asking us is how did she get there? do you know? >> you know, that was a question we had right from the beginning. we were hoping to maybe use that as a solution for how to get her out of there, but she didn't have a good answer for us at the time. and she seemed a lot more focused on how we planned to get her out. bill: i bet she did. i was reading that she was walking on a ledge and perhaps that's how she fell in between these two walls. i mean is that a possibility? this is 3:00 this the morning. >> yeah, none of the explanations really seemed to mak make a whole lot of sense. the one thing we heard is she was holding on to the wall and yelling for help when somebody actually heard her and called for 911. bill: that was a big night out, wasn't it? a night she'll never forget.

who came up with the idea to put airbags between the walls to give her separation, and who came up with the idea to spray the lubricant on her skin to free her? you were right in the middle of all of that. >> yeah, so that team that was -- that was there to extricate her, we call it a urban search and rescue team. we train regularly on different types of scenarios. we can't possibly train for every scenario, obviously, but we use several different tools to find a solution for how to extricate people from bizarre circumstances like that. bill: bizarre.ually had one firefighter that had used that lubricant rescuing an individual from a chimney stat. he suggested that,ee used it and it was helpful. bill: he has experience to make it happen. what are you going to do today? >> today is probably going to be another day filled with interviews like this one.

it's been a pretty exciting story for the most part. there's been a lot of interviews new were the man in the middle of all that. i don't know how that happened but you're a leader at heart. thanks, lieutenant. >> thank you. bill: rich chapman out of portland. top that. martha: a really nice guy. thanks to him. bill: we were watching him all day yesterday. martha: we were. i feel like i know him. here is a question that has been coming up in the last few days due to a study. can a child grow out of autism? that may be possible according to this research. we'll break it down with our medical a team.

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